60 Minutes returns to CBS after Weiss shakeups as viewers rage it's 'pathetic'
60 Minutes returns to CBS after Weiss shakeups as viewers rage it's 'pathetic'
Hannah FurnellMon, September 14, 2026 at 2:52 AM UTC
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60 Minutes has returned to CBS after several staff shakeups -Credit:Reach Publishing Services Limited
60 Minutes has returned to CBS after several staff shakeups, but viewers were not impressed.
On Sunday, September 13, CBS's newsmagazine returned for its Season 59 premiere following a series of recent staff firings, which came months after new CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss took over. Following the firings of Scott Pelley, Cecilia Vega, and Sharyn Alfonsi, 60 Minutes began its new chapter under the leadership of Weiss and new executive producer Nick Bilton by airing a segment on a search-and-rescue operation in Iran.
Now, multiple sources are claiming that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and political appointees in his department pushed for the two crew members of an F-15 who were shot down over Iran in April to participate in the report. Either way, viewers formed their own opinions about the segment, calling it "pathetic." This comes after Pelley claimed 60 Minutes' boss told him to add "falsehoods" into a story.
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On X, one person slammed, "Pathetic 60 Minutes, you tried so hard to make Pete Hegseth look like a brave heroic leader. It looks like a total propaganda piece. I wonder if the rescued soldier is real or just an actor. He did not speak in the precise, crisp disciplined way you expect."
Another social media user commented, "The Bari/Bilton 60 Minutes begins with pure Hegseth propaganda and lotsa God. Welcome to North Korea."
A third noted, "60 Minutes dropping a cinematic rescue trailer while the rest of us are just trying to mentally prepare for Monday morning. Hollywood writers taking notes for the movie adaptation already." However, Pat Adams, the Deputy Assistant to the President and Press Advisor, shared, "What a powerful interview. America is great."
During the segment, 60 Minutes' Norah O'Donnell grew emotional as she asked one of the pilots, dubbed Bravo, "What do you want the American people to know about this rescue mission?"
Bravo replied, "This is not a story about what I went through. Instead it’s a story of the teamwork, the training, the faith, of the decisions and leadership to do something that will live in history as an example of what America is willing to do in order to uphold our promise and 'leave no man behind.'"
CNN reported that Hegseth and political appointees in his department pushed for the two crew members to participate in the report on the rescue after both airmen were initially hesitant to do the interview.
60 Minutes viewers were not impressed with Pete Hegseth's Iran segment during the CBS' newsmagazine's return
While some military officials were also hesitant to reveal classified details of the rescue effort, according to three of the sources, two other insiders claimed that political appointees in Hegseth's office were adamant about both crew members' involvement in the segment.
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Hegseth met with them privately and asked whether they wanted to participate rather than forcing their cooperation, the sources added. As a result, one of the pilots, "Bravo," agreed to sit for an on-camera interview, while the other, "Alpha," declined.
The Pentagon has not publicly identified the two service members, and CNN could not independently identify them while seeking comment. In their report, CNN claimed the segment "underscores how Hegseth's office is working to craft the narrative around the Iran war," which has declined in popularity.
The outlet added, "It also shows how Hegseth has played an unusually hands-on role in that effort — engaging in the planning process for the 60 Minutes interview far more than is typical for a Defense Secretary."
Sources are claiming that Pete Hegseth urged the two service members to participate in the segment on CBS
"This entire story is a complete lie," chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said after being asked about CNN's reporting on plans for the segment. "The decision to participate in the interview was each pilot’s alone — because it is their story."
He added, "As CNN notes, one pilot decided to participate and one did not. Additionally, the Department took great care to ensure operational security, sources, and methods were protected. To suggest otherwise is to denigrate every member of our military who participated in and supported the interview."
Weiss took over as Editor-in-Chief of CBS News on October 6, 2025. Her appointment coincided with Skydance Media, led by David Ellison, acquiring CBS's parent company, Paramount, and purchasing Weiss's media site, The Free Press.
Weiss reports directly to David Ellison and has been tasked with reshaping the network's editorial direction. She has also maintained for years that CBS, along with the rest of mainstream media, is too anti-Trump, anti-Israel, and woke.
CBS' 60 Minutes has seen several firings since Bari Weiss took over last year -Credit:Getty Images for The Free Press
Just over half a dozen 60 Minutes staff members have been fired, including longtime correspondent Scott Pelley, and other correspondents Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi.
Tanya Simon, an executive producer, Draggan Mihailovich, a deputy/executive editor, Guy Campanile, a segment producer, and Matthew Polevoy, another segment producer, have also been fired. Meanwhile, Anderson Cooper resigned in May.
In his statement following his firing, Pelley accused CBS's new news leadership of stripping 60 Minutes of its DNA and pushing him "to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story" and "to include assertions that are unverified," per NPR.
Earlier this year, Alfonsi criticized Weiss for holding one of her stories at the last minute and then halting it for weeks while demanding an on-camera interview with a Trump White House official that never happened. The segment ran, unchanged from the intended version, with additional statements from the administration appended at the end.
After being fired, Vega said in a statement that her team had "experienced efforts to insert political bias into our stories." She added, "Let's call this what it is: censorship, both censorship and self-driven. It is dangerous for the show and dangerous for democracy."
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
